calcyman wrote:Updated with the last year's new elementary conduits (and semi-cenarks, which I think are elementary enough to be included as G0-to-Gs rather than as a G0-to-C)...

Thanks! Was this a manual edit, not using the conduit compiler? For now I've changed the first post in this thread to include links to thunk's April version of the collection with the conduit compiler, and your November version without all the separate conduit files. Do you have a list of the standard names for everything that was added, or should I start XORing old vs. new stamp collections to figure that out?

I'm hoping to get around to collecting recovery-time information for all of these conduits, and include that in the labels, similar to what gmc_nxtman has done for the new H-to-H collection checked in to Golly. Maybe it would make more sense to put that information in a single lookup table instead of in comments in all those separate files... but it seems like separate files are what we have at the moment, so I'll probably just make the minimal adjustments needed to the current system.

The demultiplexer is a good one-time memory cell with an output in either case, and a switch is a good long-term memory cell for disabling a signal indefinitely.

But I want a way to combine these, so that a memory cell can indefinitely produce outputs in either case.

One solution is to take a demultiplexer, and put its boat-turned output through a splitter, and then feed one of those gliders back into the demultiplexer to rebuild the boat.

Another solution is to modify the switch to provide an output in both cases. This is what I did here. The two gliders in the middle are the usual set and reset inputs for the switch. Remove the lower left one to see the different glider output.

dbell wrote:Maybe some simple salvo could be able to safely reset the memory unit.

I'm sure I'm trying to reinvent the wheel here. Is there a smaller or better solution to an indefinite switch with dual outputs?

Have you seen Paul Callahan's bistable switch? You can wire the '01' and '10' outputs of the bistable switch to the glider inputs of your circuit. (The '00' and '11' outputs can be safely eaten with eaters.)

dbell wrote:Like the original switch, the only problem with this unit is that you can't force it to a known state. It would really be nice to be able to reset it without already knowing what state it was in.

Mostly just so it doesn't get lost, here's a more recent effort -- a switch structure that M.I. Wright came up with on the ill-fated first incarnation of the ConwayLife Lounge a little while ago. The READ input functions as a boat-keeper, but there's also a RESET input and a TOGGLE input:

dbell wrote:I'm not so sure about using the bistable switch for my purpose after all, nifty as it is.

The purpose of my circuit is to set a state which can then be repeatedly tested, not just once.

This is not possible with the bistable switch unless you add some extra circuitry like splitters, edge shooters, and snarks to keep resetting it as necessary.

BCNU,-dbell

This could be closer to what you want. I'm not sure. The disadvantage is that it requires a glider pair to test the block. A Herschel creates (or recreates) the block and I'm guessing there will be a simple way to destroy the block depending on how the rest of the circuitry is completed. The 2G->H mechanism was mentioned here.

chris_c wrote:This could be closer to what you want. I'm not sure. The disadvantage is that it requires a glider pair to test the block.

That's not a glider pair that we know how to create cheaply, if I remember right. (?)

Here's the same block-keeper tested by a single glider instead of a tandem G4. Would mostly just have to wire up a glider from the pi-catching output circuit back over to the block-keeper input, to make a set-once, read-many-times memory cell.

The RESET (removing the block) would have to be done with an edge shooter pointed at a TWIT or sidesnagger, it looks like, but that's not terribly expensive as these things go.

#C A glider to boat converter based on part of a syringe.#C The boat can be tested for by a passing glider.#C David I. Bell, 29 November 2017x = 69, y = 77, rule = LifeHistory.C$2BC$3CB$.4B$2.4B$3.4B$4.4B$5.4B$6.4B$7.4B$8.4B$9.4B$10.4B$11.4B$12.4B$13.4B$14.4B$15.3BC$16.3BC$17.3CB$18.4B$19.4B$20.4B$21.4B$22.4B$23.4B$24.4B$25.4B$26.4B$27.4B$28.4B$29.4B$30.4B$31.4B$32.4B$33.4B$34.4B$35.4B$36.4B$37.4B$38.4B$39.4B$40.4B$41.4B$42.4B$43.4B$44.4B$27.C17.4B$26.2BC17.4B$26.3CB17.4B$27.4B17.4B$28.4B17.4B$29.4B17.4B$30.4B10.A6.4B$31.4B7.3A7.4B$32.4B5.A11.5B$33.4B4.2A11.4B$26.2A6.9B8.8B$27.A7.6B9.10B$27.A.2A5.6B3.B2.13B$28.A2.A4.20B2.4B$29.2AB3.21B3.4B$30.14B2A10B4.4B$31.13B2A10B5.4B$32.21B2.B2A4.4B$32.17B.B4.BA.A4.4B$33.15B10.A5.4B$33.15B10.2A5.4B$34.13B$36.13B$35.8B4.2A.A$35.6B6.2AB3A$35.5B8.B4.A$35.B.B9.2A.3A$36.3B9.A.A$35.B2AB9.A.A$36.2A11.A!

Surely this is already known since it is rather simple.

At any rate, this will be useful as a way to safely RESET my indefinite switch circuit after it has been used.

Assume the switch has two states, A and B, and the switch starts off in the default A state and there is no boat in the converter.

If you want to set the switch to state B, just do so directly.

Alternatively, if you want to set the switch to state A, then use this converter to create a boat and don't touch the switch.

Later, in order to RESET the switch to its default A state, just test for the boat and send the result to the A input of the switch.

This all assumes that you only want to set the state of the switch once before it is RESET. But that is exactly what I want.

For fun I completed my proposed glider pair block reading circuit. The repeat time of the read is 94 ticks. Here it is connected to some circuitry that allows the block to be set or reset based on an input Herschel:

Here is a circuit which can turn a glider from its path (if it is present), without having any components nearby or on the other side of the glider's path. This uses a guarded kick-back reaction where nothing escapes if the glider is not present.

Obviously the timing of the circuit must be synchronised with the other components that can produce the glider.

Remove the upper right glider to see how the circuit functions without having a glider to snatch.

#C A "glider snatcher" circuit which is an active highway robber.#C It can extract a glider from a path without any apparatus near#C the glider's path or above it.#C David I. Bell, 8 December 2017x = 337, y = 418, rule = 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A simpler type of glider snatcher (but with less clearance) could probably be made from a single Hershel conduit. All that is needed is for it to create some smoke at its edge which is able to turn a glider,and to have that turned glider be able to escape.

A single Herschel on it own has a small amount of suitable smoke, but it also has its stable leftovers which are a pain to clean up, especially a block which is right on the turned path.

dbell wrote:Here is a circuit which can turn a glider from its path (if it is present), without having any components nearby or on the other side of the glider's path. This uses a guarded kick-back reaction where nothing escapes if the glider is not present.

If enough people try building the two synchronized gliders in the guarded kickback reaction, I bet eventually someone will come up with a reasonably compact piece of circuitry. Here's my first attempt, in two parts -- neither one exactly a success:

EDIT: Here's a geometry that seems better for this kind of synchronization. It allows any +/-8N adjustment to be made -- no need to add extra Snarks on one side, or trombone slides on both sides, when the timings of the two branches are close together as in the above case:

It might be worth collecting H-to-2G splitters with this NW and SW output geometry, for all sixteen output classes. In cases where simple NW31 edge shooters are sufficient -- which in the above case they aren't -- the resulting synchronizer mechanism would be fairly compact. Here's a non-functional sample that could be easily adjusted to allow a Herschel input, but there's no point:

However, with the tendency of the R-mango to head to the west (in this orientation), combined with the height of the pi reflector catalyst, the ideal direction for the teardrop to come in would be from the southeast, but that makes it very difficult to place many R-mango catalysts that don't interfere with the teardrop's entry. I feel that a more likely use of this would be as a catalysis within a larger reaction.

Inspired by Rhombic's question, i found this new H-to-C, and this C-to-G that must be known but isn't listed in the current collection. Neither seem to fit much else, but they work together for... yet another H-to-G7!

dvgrn wrote:[ . . . ] the above substitution is not too well known, I guess, but it has been around a while. Stephen Silver mentioned it back in 2000, for example, and very occasionally it allows a Herschel circuit to fit in very close quarters; the shillelagh doesn't stick out as far as a snake / aircraft carrier / reversed eater / hat or what have you.